A case with a twist:

The nun was in a panic when Aliquippa police officers came to take her report of a mugging. The missing cash meant nothing — the 78-year-old had her wallet snatched years earlier on a mission in Brazil. This time the thief had made off with the Holy Eucharist.

It took police just two hours to track down the robber and a few more for the security chief at the Beaver County Jail, who happened to be Catholic, to deliver a spiritual guilt trip powerful enough to bring the inmate to tears.

Chief George David asked Toby Duran if he was Catholic. The suspect said "yes."

Did he know he’d robbed a nun who just returned from delivering communion to the sick and convalescent?

Mr. Duran did not.

Did he know that Catholics believe the wafers do not represent God, but are thought to be the actual embodiment of Jesus Christ?

"He [Jesus] is out there in the dark, in the cold, in the mud," Chief David said.

Mr. Duran, a 37-year-old transient who had been squatting in a trailer down the street from the St. Titus convent, immediately told the jail official where to find the nun’s handbag.